The development of syntactic subjects in Portuguese-speaking children
Bibliographic Data
| ID | 20367449 |
|---|---|
| Authors | Virginia Valian (0000-0002-2128-5856, Hunter College, corresponding author), Ziv Eisenberg (0000-0002-6480-8645, Hunter College), Zena Eisenberg |
| Year | 1996 |
| Volume | 23 |
| Issue | 1 |
| Pages | 103-128 |
| Publication date | 1996-02-01 |
| Peer Reviewed | Yes |
| Open Access | Yes |
| Type | ARTICLE |
| Venue | Journal of Child Language (JOURNAL) |
| Journal identifiers | ISSN: 0305-0009 • E-ISSN: 1469-7602 |
| Publisher | Cambridge University Press (CUP) (PUBLISHER) |
| DOI | 10.1017/s0305000900010114 |
| PMID | 8733563 |
| OpenAlex | W1967737177 |
| Language | EN |
| Citations received | 21 |
| References cited | 16 |
In order to separate competence and performance factors in acquisition of knowledge of syntactic subjects, we audiotaped and analysed the spontaneous speech of 20 Portuguese-speaking two-year-olds in natural conversation with Portuguese-speaking adults. We separated the children into three groups based on Mean Length of Utterance in Words: 1·5–1·99; 2·0–2·99; 3·0–4·99. Our cross-sectional data demonstrated that Portuguese-speaking children increased their use of subjects from 28% in the lowest-MLUW group to 57% in the highest-MLUW group. The children in the highest-MLUW group almost perfectly matched the adult speakers in the study on every measure. The increase in children's use of subjects was primarily due to an increase in the use of pronominal subjects. A comparison between Portuguese- and English-speaking children suggests that adult competence about the status of subjects is present at the onset of combinatorial speech, as shown by differential production of subjects. Each group also experiences performance limitations, as shown by the increase in subject use as development proceeds
Brazilian Portuguese · Cognition · Conversation · Developmental psychology · European Portuguese · Language development · Linguistic competence · Linguistics · Mean length of utterance · Portuguese · Psycholinguistics · Utterance · Communication · Language Development and Disorders · Neurobiology of Language and Bilingualism · Psychology · Reading and Literacy Development · Social Psychology
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When opportunity knocks twice
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Direct object predictability
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Crosslinguistic influence at the syntax–pragmatics interface
Subject/Object Drop in the Acquisition of Korean
Acceleration in multilingual children
Overt subjects in early Basque and other null subject languages
Acquiring constraints on morphosyntactic variation
Overt subjects and copula omission in the Spanish and the English grammar of English–Spanish bilinguals
Mean length of utterance and other language sample measures in early Icelandic
Transfer at the syntax-pragmatics interface
Multiple Grammars and Second Language Representation
Acquisition of reflexive and reflexively used pronouns in Croatian and Austrian German
Sociolinguistic Competence in Chinese Heritage Language Speakers
Discourse conditions on subject pronoun realization
Signs of early social cognition in children's syntax
Null objects in child language
Cross-linguistic differences in talking about scenes
Language Acquisition and the Theory of Parameters
A First Language
Operational efficiency and the growth of short-term memory span
Toward a theory of automatic information processing in reading
Controlled and automatic human information processing
Syntactic subjects in the early speech of American and Italian children
Lectures on Government and Binding
Functional Categories and Language Acquisition
Young children's imitation of sentence subjects
| Unique citing works | 21 |
|---|---|
| Citations per year | 0.7 |
| Citation span | 1996 - 2025 (30) |
| Citation velocity | recent |
| Highly cited | No |
| Citation types | Neutral: 15 |